Memories
by gracias mr bean
Summary: Tuon dies. Mat is heartbroken. Tuon doesn't die after all. Mat is happy. What else could be better? After Tarmon Gaidon
1. Memories

Memories

Apart from a lone, hooded figure with a staff, the whole stretch of road was deserted. There was not a call from a bird not the sound of crickets, only the sound of the leaves of trees on both sides of the road rustling in the cool breeze. Oblivious to his eerie surroundings, he walked on with slow, steady steps.

The hooded figure stopped. There were voices up front, at the turning of the forest road. He tensed. With the ease of a messenger used to errands, he ran forward quickly, with unnaturally long strides for his stature and he raised his long oaken staff.

He turned with the curve of the road, robes flapping in the breeze. Through the clearing in the trees he spied five burly men with rusty axes and swords cornering a farmer with his meagre harvest on a cart, drawn by a horse which looked all skin and bones, unsuitable for drawing even such a small cart with such little load.

_Brigands. Robbers. Pirates. They were all the same. Men so desperate, so poor that they resorted to robbing people._

Wielding his staff like a hurricane, he rushed into the midst of the men and struck. A well-aimed blow to the head. A hard strike to the neck. A blow to the spine. Three heavy objects fell to the ground with a thump and accompanied by a clang of metal. The other two survivors ran. The hooded figure stood still and silent.

_Men shouting, screaming…clangs of metal on metal. A whirlwind of a man, long staff in hand, topped by a foot-long blade, rushing into battle, into impossible odds with a few men at his side. And survived. The gambler. With his luck. The cunning commander._

The sound of blood dripping from the farmer's arm made him focus. When he finally noticed that the survivors had gone, the farmer was groveling on the ground, muttering a prayer.

"The rust of weapons kills a well as a knife in your ribs. You should wash your wound." The hooded figure walked on as the man whimpered.

A few moments later, the smoke from a nearby village caught the attention of the mysterious stranger. He changed his direction, heading towards the village. He drew the attention of the villagers as he walked silently towards the village inn.

"I want a room please," he said simply to the innkeeper. The innkeeper bowed and said, "It will cost you two crowns, kind sir." _Widespread poverty, hunger and killing had inflated the prices of everything after the Last Battle but the Shadow had been defeated, at a costly price only to him…Tuon…_

The hooded man took four gold coins from his robe and put it on the counter. The innkeeper's eyes widened in greed and then in fear as he saw the four-legged serpentine creature on each of the coins. The coins of the Dragon.

"For the room and for information. But first, let us play dice. One of my throws against two of yours. If you throw a number higher than mine, you get double, but if I win, I get one of those measly horses that you have."

Without waiting for the innkeeper to answer, he took out a pair of dice and pushed it over the counter. The innkeeper took the dice, quickly, cautiously, but with assured triumph on his face and threw both at once. Two fives. Ten. The innkeeper smirked, took the four gold coins and held up his hands for more.

The stranger took one die and rolled it as the innkeeper looked confused. Spinning in a circle, as fast as an arrow could fly through the air, the die rolled endlessly. Frustrated, the innkeeper banged the table. "What madness is this? Stop it you bloody madman!"

The dice stopped suddenly and rested on one of its twelve edges. A five and six. Eleven.

Impossible except for a _ta' veren_, someone who could change the pattern like the Dragon himself.

The hooded figure took one of the keys from the astonished innkeeper's pockets and asked, "Have you seen a tall, red-haired man on a piece of cloth carried as if by invisible hands? He would be accompanied by two men, six women and also an Ogier. You should have seen them. Where did they go?"

The innkeeper hesitated.

"You know who I'm looking for! The Dragon and his companions! Where did they go!"

_And the Shadow fell upon the land, and the world was riven stone from stone. The oceans fled, and the mountains were swallowed up, and the nations were scattered to the eight corners of the world. The moon was as blood, and the Sun was as ashes. The seas boiled, and the living envied the dead. All was shattered, and all but memory lost, and one memory above all others, of him who brought the Shadow and the Breaking of the World. And him they named Dragon. And it came to pass in those days, as it had come before and would come again, that the Dark lay heavy on the land and weighed down the hearts of men, and the green things failed, and hope died. And men cried out to the Creator, saying, O Light of the Heavens, Light of the World, let the promised One be born of the mountain, according to the prophecies, as he was in ages past and will be in ages to come. Let the Prince of the Morning sing to the land that green things will grow and the valley give forth lambs. Let the arm of the Lord of the Dawn shelter us from the Dark and the great sword of justice defend us. Let the Dragon ride again on the winds of Time._

"N-North, north…" the frightened man answered.

The hooded figure went upstairs and into a room. He sat down on the bed.

_Rand al' Thor. The Dragon Reborn. Aviendha, a bloody Aiel who won't bloody let go of Rand. Elayne, Queen of Andor and Cairhien, another like Aviendha. Min, a crazy woman who was able to see people's future, a third. Nynaeve al' Meara and her Warder husband, Lan. Verin Sedai and Loial, both bent on writing down the history of the Dragon. Alivia, supposedly to help Rand to die. Perrin Aybara, Lord of the Two Rivers, and his wife, Faile. People from his village and people connected to Rand. All so distant now…after Tuon died…screaming, looking at him with her eyes so bright, killed by Rand unintentionally by balefire…not even a trace of her left…_

He lay down and slept.

The next morning, the innkeeper found the door of the room open and four gold coins on the bed. He rushed down to his stable and found his best horse missing. He shivered in fear and knelt down, praying.

A mile away, the hooded man found a party of people walking in the distance. He smiled. It was impossible facing so many wielders of the Power at once. At least he would try.

Maybe he would be lucky again. Matrim Cauthon ran forward.


	2. Morning Sun

Morning Sun

The rays of the morning sun warmed Aviendha as she walked at the front of the ragtag procession, with her long Aiel knife out, scanning the front of the road for any possible threat to the group. Now that the Last Battle was over, the Pattern was in a great upheaval. The Dark One was gone for good from their world at least, but now the Pattern fluctuated constantly, making it dangerous for wielders of the Power, males and females alike, to be able to perform more than weak flows at a time.

Behind her, on a blanket supported by numerous thin flows of Air, was first and foremost, the Car' a' carn of the Aiels, the Seafolk's Coramoor, the Dragon Reborn of the wetlanders, Shadow Killer of the wolves, conqueror of Tear, Illian, founder of the Black Tower, and was the mastermind of the humbling of the White Tower. But most importantly to her, he was Rand.

A simple name to sum up all her feelings. He was doubly royal; son of Tigraine, Queen of Andor by birthright, and of Cairhien through marriage, and his father was temporary warchief of the four clans in the Aiel War, and also chief of the Iron Mountain sept of the Taardad Aiel. She was ashamed to admit it, for Aiel rarely revealed their innermost feelings, but she knew that she loved him more than anyone could ever know.

Aside from him, of course. There was that small matter of the bond.

_Fool, getting himself nearly killed -_

Shouts from the surrounding Maidens hidden around the procession, and the solid thud of stiff wood on flesh alerted her to a skirmish a good way behind the last of their group. She turned on her heel, and swiftly loped toward the source of the sounds, keeping pace with Loial and together they easily overtook Lan, who had been guarding the back.

His sword was steady in his hands behind him even on the bumpy road, leaving his legs some space to push forward.

She had always scoffed at the unwieldy contraptions the wetlanders used to counter the Aiel spears, as many a wetlander could never keep pace with Aiel spears, but Aan' allein was an exception. He was a master of the sword, revered throughout the wetlands, and former mentor of the sword to Rand, too.

A familiar figure in a black hat and scarf awaited her, with a long staff in hand. Two bodies lay on the ground, and Aviendha was relieved to see the rising and falling of chests.

They were only knocked out after all.

"Mat!" The Ogier sounded surprised.

_And well he should be_, Aviendha thought. The Gambler was unrecognizable, his normally flippant demeanor gone, face bared in a snarl. All thoughts of warning the others were gone as he lunged at her, and with all her Power tied up in supporting Rand, she reverted to being a Maiden once more, blood pounding, muscles tensing, knife flashing in the morning sun.

--

Aviendha was stumbling under his onslaught of blows, and Mat was relieved to see her trip on a rock and fall only slightly bruised. Relieved that he did not have to kill anyone. Yet.

He quickly sidestepped Loial, and the huge Ogier was left staring dumbly at the huge dent in the ground left by the butt of his Ogier war axe. Barely dodging a kick by Lan, he took advantage of his former mentor's hesitancy in fighting, swiping his legs out from under him with a sweep of the staff. Best blademaster on this side of the Aryth Ocean, down.

He ploughed a pathway through the defenders, thanking the Aelfinn for his foxhead medallion, which protected him from the Power, and nearly reached his destination when a pair of bright eyes caught his attention. It was Min, knife in hand, and looking so similar to Tuon that day.

He could still see how her eyes had found his when she flashed out of existence.

He slowed his movements, and came to a stop. Her eyes were glinting in the sunlight with unshed tears of worry, but her grip on her two daggers was firm, and he hesitated.

"Glad to know you can be stopped by a pretty face once more...after injuring so many of your friends with no apparent reason, Toy." The voice he so desperately wanted to hear again rang out from behind him, Seanchan drawl nearly gone from months of living away from her homeland.

As he turned, he caught a glimpse of somebody mounted on a horse coming out of the trees, before something hard connected with his head, and blackness consumed him.

_Bloody hell_.

--

Voices echoed in the darkness. He felt cool hands upon his face, soothing him with their feather-light caresses. The painful pounding in his head caused him to groan and with gargantuan effort he managed to force open his eyelids.

His wife was squatting beside him, and her fingers were poised gracefully on his left cheek. "You're awake, I see."

Grasping her hand, feeling the real warmth emanating from it, he finally managed to force out, "How?"

"How what, Matrim? Are you telling me that the light blow to your head has addled your brains? If so, I'm going to kill the Maiden responsible for this." Her face grew hard.

"How is it that you're still alive? R...Rand, he killed you in the Last Battle."

"The Pattern churned out whomever the Creator thought was supposed to live, Matrim. I was in the World of Dreams, and I met Artur Hawkwing! He said that I had done him and the rest of my Seanchan ancestors proud, and that both of us would go to the World of Dreams when we die, Matrim!" Excitement shone upon her face.

Mat grimaced. "How many times have I told you to call me Mat?"

"But I like your name!" She protested. "Or would you like me to call you Toy?"

The ends of her lovely lips curled up in a sly smile.

So. Only she would be so easily taken in by Hawkwing's praises. And only she would have liked to have a place next to Hawkwing when she died. He would not have liked to fight on the bloody blower of the Horn of Valere's whims after he died.

Only now, he was the blower of the Horn himself. The irony of the situation made him grimace again.

As he looked around him, he saw a ring of twenty Maidens surrounding him, and he saw the tension in their eyes. Of course. They would not like for him to attempt regicide again, to try to kill the only son of a Maiden known.

Moving his hands in what seemed to him a placating gesture, he spoke as his father would to calm the beast before the kill. "Calm down now. I'm not going to kill anyone, most of all him –"

He pointed towards the figure on the blanket, now on the ground twenty paces away from the ring of Maidens. "As I've finally found out I've made a mistake. An honest mistake, which even Rand himself would forgive me for." He tried to lighten the situation. "After all, he would have tried to do the same to me if I killed Elayne, or Min. Or Aviendha." He added as an afterthought. Though it seemed unlikely anyone, except someone as crazy as Rand would fall for her, violent and unpredictable as she was.

"Perhaps if you do not rashly attempt an escape, we might let you off in a while." The Aiel woman in question spoke sharply, over the heads of the crouching Maidens. "We camp for the night. Be ready to leave by dawn." She threw the basic equipment for constructing a tent one by one to him, and he managed to catch most of them before they dropped to the ground. Most. A tent pole knocked him on the head, and the pain which had been dwindling till that moment flared up again, white hot.

Hissing like a feral cat, Tuon produced a throwing knife from somewhere – something which she seemed to have picked up from him during his kidnap of her a year ago, now seeming ages past – and Selucia, her voluptuous bodyguard, took out a long nasty dagger, looking to her mistress for the affirmative from behind Aviendha.

The twenty Aiel women stood up, and veiled themselves, a clear warning that they were preparing themselves to kill someone. Mat quickly dropped the objects he was carrying, and picked the knife out of Tuon's grasp. "We don't want to start a fight now, do we, Tuon?"

She looked at him, righteous anger on her normally passive face, and her hand inched toward someplace he knew she kept an extra knife. Mat gave her an extra sharp look, and she sighed. Selucia faded back into the shadows.

Relieved, and oddly pleased that she had finally – finally! – followed what he asked of her in their tumultuous and yet loving - how could those two words even be used together! - marriage, he grasped her by her shoulders and set about teaching the Empress of the Seanchan how to build a tent. He risked a glance, and was thankful to see that the Maidens had taken down their veils and were chatting amicably with one another.

Later, in the tent with Tuon, and feeling slightly stunned again that she was alive, he felt warm tears slide down his cheeks as she sidled up next to him. "Well, now, I'd never thought that my Toy could cry, before." She wiped away his tears with the sleeve of her dress, and he laughed at her silly nickname with which she had stubbornly called him by before their marriage.

"Real men cry too, you know."

With pure wickedness in her eyes, she slid a hand under his shirt to rest against his chest, and pressed her slight frame against him. "Well then, would the real man like some comfort, now?"


	3. False Dragon

False Dragon

Logain, M' Hael of the Black Tower, now that Mazrim Taim, false dragon, or rather, Demandred in disguise, was dead, sat on the simple, yet elegant throne the Ogiers had sung for the Black Tower with a frown on his head.

_Callandor_, fabled crystal sword of prophecy, and the second most powerful _sa' __angreal_ to date, lay across his thighs, courtesy of the Lord Dragon.

Logain was of middling age, but his rugged and sharply defined features were considered more than middling, though, and his position, too, made him a worthy prize for any woman.

Except that Toveine would not easily let go of him after spending much effort convincing him to accept her offer of comfort after Gabrelle died. He still grieved every day, of course, for she had been the closest to forming a committed relationship with him in his whole life before Toveine, and also because of the bond, but with all the work he had to do all day as leader of a group of more than two thousand stubborn men, he could hardly spend much time, now.

"M' Hael." A Dedicated went down on one knee as he came down the hallway, and saluted, fist on heart.

"Yes, Jondion?"

"The Lord Dragon has been spotted near Caemlyn, and since gateways cannot be used till the storm passes, we dispatched an honor guard and our very best horses to fetch him and his company, however, movement is slow due to the Aes Sedai's (A/N: It can be used both as a singular and plural noun right?) insistence on carefulness. Nevertheless, our Lord should reach here by nightfall."

Jahar had been right after all. The man had died during the Last Battle, pulling in more of the Power than he could hold, and taking out a fist of Trollocs and more, when he had been about to die of a thrust between his ribs while secretly shadowing the Lord Dragon to the heart of Shayol Ghul. In doing so, he had effectively taken out the guard to its entrance, and the Lord Dragon was able to go on alone.

Then he turned up days later, appearing naked out of the air in some noblewoman's rooms in the city, causing her to faint on the spot. However, according to the story circulated by some of the more gossipy Soldiers, the lady's maids had not fainted at all, and had been brazen in their looking over of him.

He had reported to Logain as soon as he managed to get passable clothes, and informed them rather seriously that he had spoken with the Creator himself. Though his hypothesis that an upheaval in the Pattern, leading to dangerous fluctuations in the Power, had proved correct, but the idea that Creator was patching the holes left in the Pattern by the Dark One's absence was absurd, so Logain chose only to believe that the matter would right itself in a few days, and then they could start putting out raiding bands all around the countryside.

Brute force was essential to winning every battle now, but since even a single Asha' man could not be wasted and die in a hand-to-hand battle like any common soldier, the Band of the Red Hand, the Prince Consort of the Seanchan's personal army, had proved their capability even without the man himself, a brilliant commander, and who was also the Lord Dragon's childhood friend.

Jahar Narishma's bond with Merise was broken now through death, and Logain sure was glad for him, as he had one less to follow unto death, now. The prophecy foretold that he would die in service to the Dragon.

Hours later, Logain was at the gates, waiting.

"The Lord Dragon has arrived!" A Soldier managed to shout out from the road, before blaring trumpets drowned out whatever else he had to say.

_The false Dragon awaiting the true Dragon._ He mused, as the winding trail of humans began appearing slowly out of the trees.

--

The girl sniffed at the very same moment Cadsuane chose to, when they, at the front of the procession, saw the black walls and high ramparts of the Black Tower. Cadsuane raised her thick eyebrows, and Nynaeve blushed, looking away.

_It was not as grand as the __White_ _Tower__, of course. _Cadsuane thought. _But it sure looks hardier._

Her bracelet _ter' angreal_ which reacted to the One Power had vibrated very strongly moments before, and she had been forced to take it off. These Asha'man had put very strong wards on their walls, indeed, much more powerful than those of the White Tower.

_A short history of violence and bloodshed makes people paranoid._

She looked behind her. The boy was moving smoothly along on flows of Air and four mounted Asha' man flanked him.

_The girl Elayne was slick in her use of the Power,_ Cadsuane grudgingly admitted. _Much better than myself when I was her age._

Looking at the men again, she once again felt a burst of annoyance. They had insisted on bringing him to the Black Tower, and despite her imperious commands, excellently honed over the years, they had just laughed in her face.

_Foolish men. Did they think that they, who had only less than a decade to work on their use of the Power, would match any experienced Sister in Tar Varlon?_

She was still miffed that the others had agreed to the absurd idea. They still thought that the boy would feel much safer in the company of these very same madmen he had helped to train. Cadsuane thought once again of Dumai's Wells, but dismissed the idea.

_Stilling, or severing as it was called now, due to the presence of the men__ – _Cadsuane pinched in her mouth_ – could be healed fully by a wielder of the Power of the opposite sex. Though the women – what were their names again? – who had been healed by Nynaeve had nearly lost hope of ever regaining their full potential, Flinn had proved his worth as the Warder of one of the silly girls who called themselves Aes Sedai now by discovering how to strengthen the weaves used by Nynaeve, and the girls had thus been overjoyed._

As the walls of the Black Tower loomed high above them, they finally arrived at the great majestic-looking gate. At once, Cadsuane noticed Logain. The false Dragon. He was easy to pick out, for the rest of the men in black were in attendance to him, and like a wolf among sheep, he looked dangerous. That said much of the man, for the mildest Asha' man was more dangerous than fifty Trollocs, as they had been refined in the smithy of their training, fired and hammered till they became true weapons.

He came forward, straight toward the boy, without even so much as a glance at the numerous Aes Sedai ringed around him, and Cadsuane sniffed. And heard another, a moment after hers.

Looking coolly over her shoulder, she was surprised. It was the girl Nynaeve again. Looking at the girl and her husband – husband! The girl must be the first Aes Sedai since the Trolloc War to take a husband! – Cadsuane had an interesting thought. The girl reminded her of her younger self, when she was already stubborn but still unsure of the world, when she was an innocent. _It was time_, Cadsuane decided then, _to create another cantankerous woman to trouble the world._


	4. Twin Blessings

Egwene sat on the throne of the Amyrlin Seat with great boredom. At first she had taken on all the tasks of her position, but countless late nights had changed her mind. Now, any Aes Sedai who proved her talent in one of the administrative tasks had been assigned to it, and now Egwene was left with nothing to do except review some unproductive petitions which proved to be quite difficult to deflect. Gawyn was away on some Andoran business for his sister, and therefore an interesting debate about the intrigues of Seanchan politics this hot afternoon was ruled out.

Elayne. Hmph. She had indeed given birth to a boy and a girl, as Min had foreseen, but instead of cool-headed children whom Egwene thought the babies would grow up into, they had instead become twin terrors, rampaging through the palace in Caemlyn. It turned out Elayne had been as much of a brat in her youth, like Rand, who always got into trouble with Mat back home at the Two Rivers. Every child was a blessing, an age-old idiom stated. Egwene chose to remain skeptical about that.

To add unto her troubles, Sheriam had pronounced Egwene's proposal to marry her Warder scandalous. Scandalous! Nynaeve and the great numbers of Aes Sedai marrying were all right, but the idea of the Amyrlin Seat _thinking_ of marrying was _scandalous_! It was all the rage now, going to the Black Tower to net a husband. A few Aes Sedai had asked for extended trips to the Black Tower, giving quite ambiguous reasons by which Egwene was not fooled. However, she let them go, for she understood the need for physical and emotional comfort. _Besides, the Asha' man are the only men who live as long as us__ aside from wilders_, Egwene thought. _Couples like Nynaeve's were pitied, for she would outlive her husband by a couple of hundred of years._

Egwene thanked the Light once more that Gawyn had passed the test, even though his ability with the Power was weak, like his mother's, he would still be able to live as long as herself. She shivered at the thought of Gawyn white-haired and bent-backed, while she remained youthful and sprightly, and then grieving through the centuries after his death.

She decided to take a walk. Her limbs were aching from sitting in that hard chair and on the lumpy cushion provided – it was time to get a new cushion! – And besides, she was the Amyrlin Seat, and not even kings and queens could claim to be of a higher rank than her, and so who could stop her from taking an innocent walk?

As she stood, she happened to notice the newly-arrived group of men at the Tower gates. Could it be? She quickly focused flows of Air on the spot to bring her a close-up view of Gawyn before releasing the Power, shocked. It had worked! The Power was working again! Quickly she rushed to the door, flung it open, lifted up her skirt and ran down the corridor. The fact that Gawyn had arrived also helped to add to her euphoria. Quite the twin blessings, indeed.

Turning round a corner, she nearly knocked into a White, who was shocked out of her reverie by the sight of the Amyrlin. The woman looked mightily offended, before she recognised Egwene. Hurriedly, Egwene cut in before the other woman managed to curtsey. "The Power's working again!"

She turned to the window facing the courtyard, and drew on the Power to magnify her voice. "The Power's working again!" It rang out across the courtyard loud and clear, and the sisters and Warders training there looked up.

--

Well. She was back to her former self again. Rapping him on the head with a seriously heavy fan she got from the-Light-knows-where, giving him the cold shoulder whenever she felt like it. It was a good thing Pips was a good-natured horse, for he did not think most would be able to stand her current exuberant mood. What was so nice about looking at the Black Tower's armaments? They were ridiculously huge, and looked to be – manned by one person! He could not think of many weapons THAT large that required only one person to use…his own Dragons required a good three men, maybe two if you were short of them.

He decided to have some fun. Looking back to make sure that Selucia was sufficiently a goodly way behind so that he could accomplish his misdeed without her interfering, he was immediately struck with a cool gaze when his head turned back. "Are you planning to do something funny, Matrim? You know I do not like most of what you deem as funny."

Mat gave her an innocent look, by which she was not fooled. As she tried to jump off Pips, he grabbed her waist and pulled her against him. He was well aware that the thing she feared and hated most was public affection, and only little things like sharing a saddle or an arm were acceptable. She only tolerated it in some cases when she wanted to gain a upper hand over somebody, most usually himself. So he kissed her. Deeply. She resisted at first, of course, but it was futile, since he already knew all her tricks of getting out of his hold. At the cost of many bruises all over, in fact. In the end when they parted she was gasping for breath, and so was he.

He knew without a doubt that she was embarrassed and angry, and very much so, for her face was now harder than well forged steel. "You did not have to do that."

"I know." He gave her his best well-polished grin, and put his arms around her waist, and held onto the reins. She shifted a little to show that she was not going to give in so easily, and then settled in the saddle. No Seanchan were around to see anyway, and Selucia was considered a confidante. She was considerably more uptight when any of her subjects were around.

As he was about to get more comfortable, they stopped. He quickly dismounted, and offered to help his wife down. Tuon hopped off the saddle lightly, and ignored his hand beside her. Mat grimaced. As he handed the reins to a groom, he saw Cadsuane eyeing Nynaeve like a child looking at his first bit of candy. She turned the full prowess of her gaze upon him. He grinned weakly at her. _That_ was one to look out for.

He walked casually to Nynaeve's side, and whispered, "Look out. The cranky Aes Sedai has her eyes on you. I think she is about to pull you into some absurd scheme of hers. You know those Aes Sedai."

Nynaeve sniffed and walked off. "Mind your own business." Mat was about to follow her when Lan casually stood in his way, and Mat stood back. He was not one to invite a beating, and besides, she obviously did not care for his valuable advice.

_Women._ Mat thought. _They just didn't appreciate what you did for them._ He took out his waterskin and took a long draught of the finest Tairen wine, and followed them in.


End file.
